Dedicated to Dr. Chidi Nwachukwu, colleague and friend, mentor, loving husband, proud father and proud Nigerian. A native of Port Harcourt in the Niger Delta, and a citizen of the US and Nigeria who's vision for his beloved homeland lives on even after he lost his fierce battle with leukemia. To this day we can hear his voice saying
"Never Give Up!"
"Never Give Up!"
Overview
Creating Sustainable Enterprise Recovery and
Empowerment Zones in the Niger Delta
A Market-driven Sustainable Cleanup Solution
Carbon-Negative, scaleable, and sustainable oil cleanup model and reclamation
process enabling the development of Sustainable Enterprise Recovery & Empowerment Zones
Phoenix: a legendary bird which according to one account lived 500 years, burned itself to ashes on a pyre, and rose alive from the ashes to live again; also : A symbol of regeneration, renaissance, recovery, revival or rebirth; also: a person or thing likened to the Phoenix.
Executive Summary
The Phoenix is an ancient symbol for rebirth and renaissance. The Phoenix Project intends to create an Enterprise Recovery and Empowerment Zone in the Niger Delta. This is a pilot project proposed by The Electronic Community Project, The Institute for Communications and Development Assistance; and The Women’s Empowerment Network of Nigeria; in cooperation with MOP Environmental Solutions, Inc., Texas Aquatic Harvesters, Indian Country Environmental Associates, Vincent Corp and local NGOs and communities in the Niger Delta. It is a concept that has been in the making for more than four years as members of our team have developed and researched the various components of the project and developed the capabilities.
In short, we will clean up oil spills and use the cleanup technologies to drive economic opportunity, local entrepreneurial activity, research and poverty alleviation within the Zone. Once we have restored the agricultural vitality of the Zone we will move on to the next identified area replicating the concept and making it available to others through Open Source distribution of the technologies.
Enterprise Recovery and Empowerment Zones:
- Will create reliable electricity for the communities and businesses within the zone using a CARBON NEGATIVE technology for generating electricity in a region without reliable electricity. The results will be more reliable electricity, jobs and both research and entrepreneurial opportunities. The electricity can be used for the growth of indigenous businesses or sold into the grid to fund other important activities.
- Use a Carbon Negative Green Technology that will sequester more carbon than it produces. Other than steam and a minimal amount of Co2, there is NO effluent or emissions from our closed carbon negative system. There are NO noxious emissions.
- Will produce, for market, BioChar, a soil amendment that enhances agricultural productivity and plant growth by up to 400%. Biochar may also have bio-remediation capabilities and we will conduct research around this.
- Will clean up Oil Spills that have plagued the Niger Delta;
- Will qualify for and sell through a qualified broker, carbon credits under the Kyoto protocols. (***Note We are trying to determine whether this project will qualify***)
- Will create a Zone of Enterprise and Empowerment where multiple streams of economic activity, training and research provide home grown benefits to indigenous people.
- Will Create alliances with local and regional NGOs like the Women's Empowerment Network to provide training and entrepreneurial activities around the various profit centers generated by the activities of the ERE-Zone.
We intend to do what Oil Companies and the government have failed to do. Clean up the oil that has been spilled in the Zone, restore the agricultural vigor of the Zone and provide meaningful employment opportunities to local people.
We intend to encourage/compel the oil companies to act, to participate in the funding of future ERE-Zones by showing them that there is a way to cleanup oil spills that can benefit the community and demonstrate their goodwill and willingness to accept responsibility, AND LOWER THEIR COSTS.
About The Crowd Funding Campaign
We intend to launch a crowd funding campaign within the next 3 weeks to seed this pilot project. The Crowd Funding effort is targeted at creating the “Seed” funding for this project, including the reconaissance mission required to bring together community leaders, citizens, governmental leaders and oil companies and to identify the best site for the initial pilot.
The 8 million dollar cost of this project is largely for capital equipment costs and the more we can raise from the crowd funding effort the less we will need to rely on oil companies and others with a vested interest for funding.
Our goal for the Crowd Funding campaign is still not set. However, anything raised beyond this figure will go directly toward the costs of completing the Niger Delta ERE Zone.
Introduction: A New Paradigm for Oil Cleanup
“The Niger Delta experiences oil spills equivalent to the Gulf of Mexico Spill on an annual basis.” - Amnesty International
It is a well known fact that the Niger Delta region has a growing environmental crisis precipitated by oil spills in a region that has become the site of a collision between the rich agricultural resources and traditions of the Niger Delta and the oil wealth that lies below the surface of these same lands and waters. For example, according to the Vanguard Newspaper, “Yenagoa – The rural settlement of Emago-Kugbo, a border settlement between Bayelsa and Rivers has been hit by a series of oil spills leading to the destruction of community farmland and creek, their source of drinking water.” The community reports not only serious environmental problems but deaths among younger children.
It is a well known fact that the Niger Delta region has a growing environmental crisis precipitated by oil spills in a region that has become the site of a collision between the rich agricultural resources and traditions of the Niger Delta and the oil wealth that lies below the surface of these same lands and waters. For example, according to the Vanguard Newspaper, “Yenagoa – The rural settlement of Emago-Kugbo, a border settlement between Bayelsa and Rivers has been hit by a series of oil spills leading to the destruction of community farmland and creek, their source of drinking water.” The community reports not only serious environmental problems but deaths among younger children.
This document proposes a pilot project aimed at Creating Sustainable Enterprise Recovery and Empowerment Zones in the Niger Delta Employing a scale-able, cost effective and sustainable oil cleanup and reclamation process to enable the development of Sustainable Cleanup Zones that drive the development of indigenous entrepreneurial ventures created around the opportunities created by the cleanup, and the profitable by-products of pyrolysis and electricity generation. Additionally, research, capacity building and empowerment opportunities will be created; funded by the profit streams and outside resources and catalyzed by the energy and creativity of the partner organizations and other local individuals, businesses and organizations.
Description of the Lead Organization
The Electronic Community Project began as a Ford Foundation project to link and train NGOs throughout W. Africa in a community of shared interest to enhance professional development, technical skills and communication. The founders have continued to do work on Capacity development in the region especially in Nigeria and Ghana.
Organizations and Businesses Involved:
Managing Partners
Managing Partners
The Electronic Community Project, New Hampshire/California USA
ICDA The Institute for Communications and Development Assistance, Nigeria - In Country Administrative Partner
AWEP - African Women Entrepreneurship Program
Cleanup Partners
ICDA The Institute for Communications and Development Assistance, Nigeria - In Country Administrative Partner
AWEP - African Women Entrepreneurship Program
Cleanup Partners
MOP Environmental Solutions, Inc.
EcoReps - USA and Australia - Pyrolysis Partner
Indian Country Environmental Services
Indian Country Environmental Services
Texas Aquatic Harvesters, Florida, USA - Oil Recovery Harvesting
Vincent Corporation, Florida: Providing oil recovery equipment
Commerce, Research and Training Partners
Wilbahi Investments Limited: Nigerian Holding Company with interests in agriculture and energy
Legal and IP Partners: Still under consideration
Project information
Purpose of the Project
Problems and Issues the Project Will Address
Environmentally effective and cost effective oil spill cleanup done in a sustainable and visionary way utilizing the financial resources for cleanup to also create profitable entrepreneurial, training and research activities benefitting local NGOs, businesses and individuals. Ultimately creating an industry training and research zone or park catalyzed by a small power plant and the by-products and opportunities created as a result of its development.
Estimated Overall Budget for the Project
8 million US Dollars
Funding for this important pilot is expected to come from a number of sources. We hope to secure a grant of approximately $200,000. to cover the cost of Pre-development administration: Meaning early -stage administrative and legal work. We hope to jump start the project with a Crowd-Funding effort to allow us to do an end run around the Oil Companies who will eventually buy into the project when they know that that can't kill it by ignoring it. Crowd funding to seed the project will be used to fund Site Reconnaissance, site selection, local NGO meetings and other pre-development administrative costs.
The lions share of the funding will come from a combination of Spill Cleanup funds from oil companies and other leveraged funding from both traditional and non-traditional sources.
Oil Company funding for Spill cleanup should not be seen as a grant unless the company is paying for a spill for which it is not responsible. We hope to see the process of oil spill cleanup become less contentious as a result of this project and the processes involved and, in fact, see this as an opportunity to create a sort of legal laboratory for the development of innovative solutions to the legal issues surrounding oil spill cleanup, experimenting for example with voluntary consent agreements for cleanup and other instruments that will expedite the resolution of both the legal and environmental issues that too often fester because of the time required to get everyone engaged in a final resolution.
The portion of the funding that represents the cleanup of the oil spill is not an additional cost to the Oil Company involved. Instead it is a matter of moving existing expenditures to a different line item within the cleanup and bioremediation portion of the corporate budget. It is NOT philanthropic spending it is a business expense. This portion of the budget of the EREZone Pilot and each succeeding EREZone will always come from an oil company as a business related expense. The incentive for the Oil Company will be that the EREZone concept is designed to reduce the cost of cleanup. Their voluntary participation in the creation of an EREZone will mean that they see a savings of about 25% on the cost of cleanup.
Benefitting Locations for the Pilot
We hope to propose this for Ikarama In Bayelsa on the Niger Delta, but the concept is replicable anywhere.
Comments
This project has been under development for 4 years. It has evolved from a simple cleanup proposal to a much broader sustainable effort to create economic activity and entrepreneurial opportunity by using the resources devoted to the cleanup to both fund the environmental work and catalyze entrepreneurship, training, research and empowerment within the community. If the pilot is as successful as we anticipate we will move on to the next E&E Zone leaving behind a small power plant and a trained team of local managers that serves as the heart of continuing economic activity, producing electricity and other by-products that serve as profit centers for the continuing activities of the E&E Zone.
Imagine this . . .
A site is selected that has experienced a serious oil spill on land and in water. Nearby is a rice processing facility that generates tons of waste on a weekly basis in the form of hulls. Currently the company that processes the rice has no good choices about disposal. At this point the prospective EREZone has the makings of both a short and long term source of biomass for the operation of a small .5 - 1MW portable pyrolysis plant. The Pyrolysis plant can process both the oil absorbent and the rice hulls. Additionally, should the source of biomass disappear for some unknown reason, it could also process municipal waste or some other clean biomass.
The portable plant uses pyrolysis - an oxygen free process with no smokestack and therefor no discharge of emissions. It is a carbon capturing process and ultimately serves as the engine of a carbon negative system. The plant is mobile because it permits us to move it to the next EREZone or to leave it (the plant)- our preferred end game - as the ongoing source of energy and profit generation for the community.*
The portable plant uses pyrolysis - an oxygen free process with no smokestack and therefor no discharge of emissions. It is a carbon capturing process and ultimately serves as the engine of a carbon negative system. The plant is mobile because it permits us to move it to the next EREZone or to leave it (the plant)- our preferred end game - as the ongoing source of energy and profit generation for the community.*
The flexibility to leave the Mobile Pyrolysis Unit allows us to redirect resources where they can be most effective for the community or to reduce costs in order to assure sustainability.
As the spill is cleaned up the oil laden sorbent can be put through a screw press to recover and recycle the oil which can be sold into a secondary market. The remaining used sorbent can be burned in the pyrolysis unit generating electricity and/or biofuel as well as biochar - a highly effective soil additive that also serves as a carbon sink and a method of enhancing the bioremediation of soils both speeding up the final biodegradation of any remaining hydrocarbons as well as capturing heavy metals in the soil. Biochar enhances the productivity of the soil between 200 - 400%, supercharging the fertility as well as serving as a carbon sink.
These processes and byproducts create multiple profit centers in the process. Creating job opportunities, training opportunities, research into other uses and markets for the products as well as research into the processes being used and other prospective processes.
Working with local organizations such as agricultural NGOs, Women’s Empowerment NGOs, Environmental NGOs and NGOs fostering entrepreneurship as well as developing a professional management team for the long-term management of the EREZone we believe we can create a critical mass that catalyzes the growth of an Enterprise and Research Center within the community that provides indigenous electric power and economic opportunity.
Want to help? contact us at TheElectroniccommunity@gmail.com
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